Tip about getting female gamers...

[Telgian]

Arravis,

I would reccomend to you ICE's Gamemaster Law if you can find a copy of it. The first half of the book is not Rolemaster specific, but offers general GM advice. Of particular intrest to you would be the "Player Zodiac" found on pg. 8.

I think that it could help you identify the tendancies in your players (and potential players) without resorting to gender and stereotypes.

Gamemaster Law
Copyright 1995, Iron Crown Enterprises, Inc.
ISBN 1-55806-217-3

I am glad that your group works well and is happy with your style. In the end having fun is what matters.
Sadly, in this thread, you do not come across very well. A difficulty of electronic media perhaps?

Telgian.

BTW -- Just out of morbid curiosity, how would role-reversal fit into things?

 

[DDK]

I think our group would fall apart if there was a female in it... unless she was ugly and had a good personality.

I know that sounds bad but it's true. If a reasonably good looking woman joined our group I think the dynamics of it would change for the worse. I know at least one player who would fawn all over her and I would be conscious of it and get pissed off.

I think I'd also be somewhat conscious of the fact that she's a she and so would have to make a considered effort not to treat her differently. It's not that I'm sexist, it's more that the difference is a difference, if you know what I mean... I can't explain it properly.

Funnily enough, there is a gay guy in our group and it's never been a problem for me... heh, I knew that 33% I got on the gay test would benefit me some day!

 

[Orco42]

I knew that 33% I got on the gay test would benefit me some day!

You know, that would make you more bi than straight.

 

[Buttercup]

I think I'd also be somewhat conscious of the fact that she's a she and so would have to make a considered effort not to treat her differently. It's not that I'm sexist, it's more that the difference is a difference, if you know what I mean... I can't explain it properly.

I really don't understand. Do you have no female friends? Do you work with any women? Can you talk to a woman without thinking about rolling in the hay with her? I'm not trying to be nasty, I'm just totally perplexed.

I mean, in my job I supervise males and females, and there's no difference in how that's done. I work on committees with both males and females, sometimes as a committee member, and sometimes as chair, and gender doesn't enter into it at all. It would be completely freaky and horrible if it did.

Again, I'm not trying to start a fight, but this reminds me of a conversation I had with a fellow student back in graduate school. We were talking about the Americans With Disabilities Act, and she said "Well my problem with handicapped people is, what do you say to them?" Apparently she thought that having a handicap invalidated every other aspect of a person's being.

Your post makes me feel like you think women aren't quite human.

 

[DDK]

I really don't understand. Do you have no female friends? Do you work with any women? Can you talk to a woman without thinking about rolling in the hay with her? I'm not trying to be nasty, I'm just totally perplexed.


Your post makes me feel like you think women aren't quite human.

Like I said, it's hard to explain. Funnily enough, I get along better with most women than I do with most men. Most of my friends (if you include online friends) are female. I think in a work situation I'd probably not be conscious of it.

But for some reason, the whole gaming experience is different and for some reason, I think that I would act differently in such a situation. That's not to say that I'd treat a woman any differently, more that I think I'd be conscious of just how I was treating her and therefore would have to make an effort NOT to treat her differently. Like I said, it's hard to explain.

For what's it's worth, I meant no offence and didn't mean to make you feel any less or more than me... see what I mean, even here I have to make an effort! Arrrrrgh!

 

[ElectricShrubbery]

First, I think part of it is that the game itself is a fantasy escape. Hence some males that are, in real life, uncomfortable around females, will try to live out THEIR fantasies a bit through the game. Some D&D players like the game for that very reason - they can be a hero while sitting on their ass. I like it because it allows me to engage in my punny sense of humor for hours on end, and is, after all, an afternoon with pizza and friends.

Secondly, if the one of the group members is attracted to another, that will result in a bias over decisions in the game.

Thirdly, yeah: some guys really can't deal with girls, so they can be a distraction. Ex: There's this kid in my high school who went to all-male catholic schools for all of his earlier years. He has no idea how to act around women, so he just stares. And stares. And follows them around. They tell him to go away, he doesn't listen. Frankly, I've had girls tell me they think he's a serial killer, or stalker, or something. I'm not saying D&D players are that bad (after all, I'm one, and we'd NEVER invite the guy to our games), but that level of awkwardness is indeed possible to reach.

Fourth, I can indeed beleive that women desire different things in the game. Guys and gals are different.

Finally, guys that are uncomfortable around girls in any way might have trouble recruiting/interacting with them in the first place.

Personally? I'd love to see more females interested in D&D. I was happy that my previous girlfriend was very into MUDing...

 

[JeffK1966]

I think part of the problem is that some male gamers have been gaming in male only gaming environments for so long, that throwing a woman into the mix confuses them in that they do not know how to act all the time in what was a previously male only environment. That in turn, makes them uncomfortable and may make the woman uncomfortable in turn.

We had a fairly stable large group, but our DM and I were always trying to find a good new player or .two. We found one guy that seemed really good. He was in to the role-playing aspects, but also liked the combat, and he always seemed to come up with a bright idea to save the group’s collective butts on several occasions.

Well, one day he asked if his girlfriend could join the group, as she had done some gaming. Naturally, we welcomed her aboard. She was a very pretty woman, and not just pretty for a gamer pretty.

She fit in well with the group, but the DM and I both noticed some subtle changes in group behavior. The guys in the group tried to be a bit more heroic in game, or come up with that bring the house down one liner in a life or death situation, only to sometimes put their foots in their mouths.

The swearing was cut down quite a bit the first several weeks as well, but it picked up after she became "one of the guys." However, I don’t really remember the guys publicly breaking wind after that ike they might do with just guys around.

But, a month or two after she joined the group and was doing well with as an elven enchantress, we tried out another guy. After being fairly normal in the first session, he came back for a game of Cyberpunk or Shadowrun ,or some other dark future game, later and insisted on playing a former female prostitute (or was it a porn star?) with huge breasts who had used her feminine charms to distract the guards and get out of prison. Then, when it came back to D&D the next week, he wanted his first full character to be a kender paladin/thief modeled after Batman. Never mind that Kalamar did not have kinder and 2E did not allow for multi-class or non-human paladins. When the DM nixed the guy’s idea, he 'settled' for a human paladin named Bwayne (get it, B Wayne for Bruce Wayne)...if the guy was not on enough thin ice after his female prostitute thing, he made the woman in our group uncomfortable by constantly leaning back in his chair and leering at her.

So, he obviously was gone pretty quickly. And, it turns out that we strongly suspect that he switched his old, beat up copy of the 2E Fighter's Handbook with the DM's mint condition handbook before he left.

 

[Arravis]

Buutercup wrote:

***Can you talk to a woman without thinking about rolling in the hay with her? I'm not trying to be nasty, I'm just totally perplexed.***

I don't know of any guys that don't do this actually. Now, how good a guy is at keeping these thoughts to himself is a different issue. I see it as a simple issue of evolution. A male can spread his seed among many females and propegate the species, since propegation of the species is pretty much in the top 3 evolutionary instincts... it's fairly common. Now, we live in a civilized society and that behavior isn't accepted so those instincts are surpressed and we are able to focus our energy on things we deem more productive. That doesn't mean that those instincts aren't there, they are simply handled differently then we did 40,000 years ago.

***Your post makes me feel like you think women aren't quite human.***

Men are sexually attracted to women, so they will naturally treat them different. I don't think that makes women "not quite human". It's just a natural instinct. Does that mean we can't overcome that instinct for the most part? I don't think so... I think for the most part we can, but there will likely always be a slight difference that is noticable (and perhaps bigger differences in treatment that aren't noticable or even conscious).


And yeah... I know this post is likelt to stir up another bees nest, but I can't bring myself to sugar coat it.

 

[Rube]

Sheesh, hon

Can't you just let us ladies have our fantasy of men not being sex-hungry pigs 24 hours a day?

Personally, I'd rather not have to look at the guys that live around us that stare at me a lot and think "darn..he wants to have sex with me." Ewww.

Alright, I am Arravis's RL girlfriend and member of his gaming group. He has been worrying that many of you think he's a sexist pig. He's not. He might be a bit of an overly-romantic lug who has trouble understanding social rules sometimes (like now), but he's not by any stretch of the imagination a sexist pig.

Now, the whole shopping thing that he was talking about earlier in the thread is mostly my character. I'm afraid I caught him flat-footed when during one of the games he was DMing (we play Forgotten Realms, this was during Shieldmeet). While the other players were poking around the tents, booths, and stalls looking for their nice little sensible things (ie magic items, barding for their horses, haggus, ale, wenches) my character immediately located the lingerie tent and plunked down 3,000 gold on nothing but silkies, lacies, leather..what have you. My character DOES really love to shop. I don't myself, but since Rube is nouveau riche, she has a lot of money to throw around.

Ever since then, everywhere our party goes, I ask how's the shopping. That's why he anticipates it.

Now, shopping isn't the only thing we ladies do in game. The other female, for the most part, rules her own small kingdom, and I'm breaking into fencing and piracy.

As for the whole gender stereotyping issue. Before I came along and we formed our core group with another friend and his wife, I don't really think Arravis had much experience with girls who actually wanted to game. I grew up in a gaming family (dad, mom, brothers, their friends, friends' girlfriends/wives) so gamers are old hat to me, but Arravis had only ever had guys in his groups. I don't blame him for trying to employ gender stereotypes when we first started out. He has wisened up a lot in the past year and half, though. He listens to us and does things in game that he knows we two ladies would enjoy, as well as the two other guys, even the munchkin hack n' slasher.

-Rube

P.S. If you're that hard up and need to have a guy in your group play a female character, make sure it's a mature guy doing it. We had one guy in our group do it for an adventure and he turned out to be so insecure about his own sexuality that he couldn't do it, and quit the game altogether. We passed the torch onto another guy in the group and he turned her into the biggest over-sexed ditz in Faerun.

 

[DynaMup]

As Buttercup et al. have been saying over these boards, there really shouldn't need to be any distinction between female and male gamers. When most of us started out in this hobby, it was true that it was extremely male dominated. These days, I think it's far more balanced.

I'm very conscious of the stereotype geeky gamer who's never had a girlfriend, blah, blah - and would be hopeless around women with pathetic displays that would be out of place in any walk of life. Sadly, there are many of these around - but I've never had this problem in any of my groups.

I'm glad to see that the "gender divide" in gaming is coming to an end - it makes everything far more enjoyable for us all.